Tanzanian
journalist Erick Kabendera (L) leaves the prison where he had been held
for several months on Feb. 24, 2019 in Tanzania, freed after pleading
guilty to economic crimes.
By Salem Solomon
Advocacy groups are
asking questions about the future of Tanzania's press freedom after the...
recent release from prison of a prominent Tanzanian journalist.
In July, Erick
Kabendera was arrested at his home in Dar es Salaam and charged with
money laundering, tax evasion and leading organized crime.
Kabendera has
written investigative articles for local and international publications.
One of the last articles published before his arrest ran in the East
African and bore the headline: “No end in sight as Tanzania’s ruling
party, CCM, goes for ‘dissenters.’” It outlined fractures within
Tanzania’s ruling party.
To gain his
release, Kabendera accepted a plea deal with prosecutors. He agreed to
pay a $74,000 fine for failure to pay taxes and $44,000 for money
laundering. Reached by phone, Kabendera’s attorney, Jebra Kambole, said
his client suffered health problems while incarcerated and chose to
accept the plea rather than fight the charges.
“I have the duty to
do everything possible to reach an agreement with the prosecutor,”
Kambole told VOA’s Swahili service. “So, we reached an agreement and it
has been part of his sentencing, for his acceptance of being guilty, and
it was agreed to drop the charge for leading a criminal gang. His guilt
was based on the agreement we had to reach for his release.”
Since the election
of President John Magufuli in 2015, Tanzania has seen restrictions
placed on free speech. The Media Services Act passed in 2016 makes it a
crime to “write or print seditious content” calling for a maximum jail
time of five years for people who violate it. The law has been used to
halt the operations of several media outlets including Tanzania’s
venerable newspaper The Citizen which saw operations suspended for seven
days in February 2019 on charges it had published “fake news.”
“Since Magufuli
became president in Tanzania, the environment has drastically
deteriorated,” Muthoki Mumo, East Africa Correspondent at the Committee
to Protect Journalists, told VOA. “Various tools have been used to
repress the media, to silence journalists. Some of these have been laws,
some of which were drafted and enacted before Magufuli, but which have
been implemented quite aggressively under his presidency.”
Mumo said she
personally experienced intimidation while traveling to the country. She
and a colleague were detained by plainclothes security personnel for
several hours, who physically and verbally harassed them, she said.
“It brought home
really how difficult things had become for journalists in Tanzania, for
press freedom advocates in Tanzania in general,” said Mumo. “Because we
had the advantage that we were able to leave and to go back to our
homes. But really, it's sort of contextualized and made us really
reflect upon the challenges that the people who operate in this
environment on a day to day basis face.”
As Tanzania enters
an election year, observers are worried that repression could worsen.
There is a blanket ban on political rallies in the country and tensions
are high. Amnesty International Tanzania researcher Roland Ebole said
that recent arrests could have a chilling effect on the ability of the
press to cover elections. He pointed out the irony that Magufuli,
nicknamed “the bulldozer,” who has positioned himself as a reformer and
anti-corruption advocate, will not allow a free press to operate.
“It's really
strange that a government, an administration, that has put itself as one
that is there to fight corruption and to build the economy of a country
in development would also not want a journalist to report on the same
issues and especially to report freely on the same issues,” he told VOA.
This story originated in the Africa Division with reporting contributions from VOA’s Swahili service Abdushakur Aboud.
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